


Gelifraction

by cuddlesome



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Main Video Game Series), Pocket Monsters | Pokemon - All Media Types, Pocket Monsters: Sword & Shield | Pokemon Sword & Shield Versions
Genre: Angst, Arguing, Celebrities, Dysfunctional Family, Eventual Happy Ending, Gen, Mild Language, Minor Violence, Mother-Son Relationship, Self-Esteem Issues, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Weight Issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-14
Updated: 2020-10-26
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:53:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,267
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26972461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cuddlesome/pseuds/cuddlesome
Summary: Gordie's relationship with his mummy is complicated.
Relationships: Makuwa | Gordie & Melon | Melony, Makuwa | Gordie & Nezu | Piers
Comments: 31
Kudos: 30





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> / drives up a year late to Sw+Sh fandom, honks _La Cucaracha_ horn, and sticks head out of the window/ I heard you lot have a dysfunctional parent/child relationship. I want in. 
> 
> Also, gelifraction is breaking and churning of rock thanks to repeated freezing and thawing of water within it. I had to explain that because this might be the most fitting title I've had in a while.

They always argue. Without fail. There was some big argument in the past that kicked it all off, but Gordie can't remember who or what started it. Now there's always something new to fight with her about. Mostly her criticism of him.

Mummy hunts him down in the locker room to scold him on his poor technique in his last battle. As if he needs more kicking when he's down. He forgets to lock the door, something he won't be making the mistake of doing again.

She stands over where he sits on the bench, arms crossed, looking entirely too pristine to be in a sweaty locker room.

"Heat crash on a dracovish?" She asks. "What were you thinking?"

Gordie shrugs off his jacket, pushes his glasses up on his head, and scrubs at his face with a towel.

"I panicked, all right? It looked like it could be a grass type."

It's an embarrassing, amateur mistake. He knows that, she knows that, and he wishes they could just move on.

In his defense, he'd been knackered from a long day of battling. The dracovish was little more than a bluish-green smudge on the other side of the stadium, further obscured by his fogged-up sunglasses. Its nickname, Helvetica, hadn't really given him any hints about its species or type, either.

She looks at him with that perceptive Mummy look that makes him squirm.

She reaches out, pushing his bangs off of his face, and presses a cold hand to his forehead. "Are you sick? You feel warm..."

"It's just the stadium lights, you know that," he says, batting her hands away. "Maybe, just maybe, I mucked up the battle."

Just admitting that makes him want to throw up all over her white boots.

"You've been mucking up a lot lately, is all."

Mummy always has a sweet disposition with an edge hinting at how harsh she can be with her trainees. He swears she saves the sharpest for him.

He stands up and abruptly remembers how he's gotten taller than her. And wider, for that matter. The former, at least, gives him a little shot of confidence.

"I'm not a child anymore. Stop treating me like one."

"Stop acting like one, then. You can't handle any sort of criticism, you don't take any advice—"

He glowers. "Yeah, because I didn't ask."

Gordie decides he’d rather just leave than listen to her anymore. He grabs his street jacket and puts it on to cover up the gym logos on his undershirt. He still has his shorts on, but there's no way he's changing into longer trousers with her there. He'll just brave the snow with his bare legs. Wouldn't be the first time.

He turns away from her without bothering to say goodbye.

Her voice goes from level and mellow to frigid. "Don't turn your back on me, Gordon."

It used to scare him when she used his full name, especially in that tone. Now he just scoffs.

"I'm a grown man, I'll do whatever I want.”

“You may look like a grown-up, but even your baby brothers and sister are more mature than you."

“You're going to bring them into this? Really?" Gordie shakes his head and slides his sunglasses back into place. "You shouldn’t come here unless it's your season for running the gym. I can handle myself."

He uses the back exit to avoid any paparazzi that are waiting to pounce on him. He can feel her staring at him up until the moment he's outside in the cold. Even then, all the snow is just a reminder of her. He kicks over a pile of slush but doesn't feel any better.

* * *

He doesn’t agree to meet her for dinner that weekend. She just shows up at his favorite curry place and sits down on the other side of the table.

She doesn't make any sort of effort to cover up her identity like he does when he wants to eat a meal in peace. He shoved his hair under a hat and wore nondescript clothes. He even wears less bombastic sunglasses than usual. She just walks into the place with blinding white attire on, signifying exactly who she is. 

He can already see other patrons pulling out their phones to take pictures. They'll be all over social media in minutes. Bugger.

"Wonderful weather we're having," she says.

It's blizzarding. Again. Like it always does in Circhester. What is she talking about? He turns it over in his mind for a second before deciding it doesn't matter.

More importantly—“What are you doing here?”

With that, she cuts straight to the point. “Have you gained some weight recently? I’m worried about you.”

“Arceus, Mummy, you can’t just ask that," he says, lowering his voice and looking at the other patrons to try to gauge if they'd overheard.

His gym clothes are tailored to flatter his body, but in his street clothes, well. The stress of his most recent losses show in his gut and thighs.

Then there are the things others can't see. His trousers cut into him. His knees ache thanks to spending all day on his feet at the gym. He'll never admit to his mother that he occasionally pops pain pills in between matches just so he can stay standing after all the barani flips that have become his trademark.

Distracting himself from how much he feels like a loser by eating gifts from his fans in the locker room may have happened once or twice... maybe more like ten or eleven times. They’ll make him snacks or give him chocolate and who is he to say no?

His mum still looks at him expectantly, hands folded in front of her. "I'm only trying to figure out what could be wrong."

"Nothing's wrong." He hesitates, then adds, “Maybe I’ve gotten a bit bigger, but the fans don’t mind. Just makes photo ops more cuddly.”

He grins with confidence he doesn’t feel. He's seen the tabloids that compare him to abomasnows (he just can’t get away from ice types). She's not the only one who noticed he's put on weight.

“The fans? You're worried about what they think? Gordie, what about you?”

“What about me?”

She frowns. “Don’t be difficult. This could be an indicator of something else."

He pushes his sunglasses up on his nose and takes another bite of curry. He has to resist pointing out that she isn't in the best shape of her life, either.

She flags down the waiter to order some ice water, leaving a tense moment of no communication between them save intense staring.

“I'm fine," he says once the waiter is gone. "I work out every day.”

Not enough to burn off all the extra calories, but that’s besides the point. As long as he's strong enough to comfortably pick up heavy rock types, what's the issue?

"You're young now, but you'll feel the effects of being overweight when you're older."

Saying that she knows all about that is on the tip of his tongue. He takes another bite of food to stifle it. Mummy takes a sip of water. He swallows.

"Don't worry," is all he can muster.

Again, he flashes a confident smile, the one the fans just die for. It's more for the benefit of the rotom phones still taking pictures of them than her. He knows she has her own secret smile up her sleeve, too, but she doesn't show it off right now.

"I'm fine," he repeats. “My body is a temple.”

“Then why do you keep treating it like a decorative trash can?”

Ouch. He's pulling all of his punches, but she clearly isn't willing to do the same for him. Gordie looks down at the table, grimacing as his sunglasses slip down the bridge of his nose. She acts like he didn’t inherit his eating habits and weight issues from her. He forces himself to look directly at her again.

He takes a huge, defiant bite of curry, then another. Doing it for the sake of antagonizing her is childish, he knows, but he gets a sense of satisfaction in seeing her eyes narrow in aggravation.

"Gordie..." She says in warning.

He scrapes the remainder up and eats that, too. He's tempted to lick the plate, but that would just be overkill at this point. Not to mention terrible for his image.

He hadn’t planned on eating all of it and his stomach aches with fullness. Still, he makes a show of standing tall and giving his middle an affectionate pat before he drops a handful of money on the table to pay for his dinner.

“You need to learn to stop running away, Gordie,” Mummy calls after him as he leaves.

How can he when it's the only way he knows to solve things with her?

* * *

On the occasions he wins and is in the mood for it, Gordie allows himself to get mobbed by fans outside of the stadium. Sure, it means that a lot of them are fair weather. But hey, they can’t all be the types that think he’s fetching even when he’s locked in the locker room or scarfing down heaps of food.

One of those days he has a winning streak through all of his challenges. The fans love it.

He doesn’t have any shortage of them. He manages to appeal to multiple demographics at once; rock type enthusiasts, those who like his theatrics, and... for whatever reason, a lot of women of all ages who seem more interested in him than his pokémon.

He can only figure it’s the confidence, the brave face he puts on when others are around. The clothes, the hair, the flips. It all screams that he’s sure of himself even if it couldn’t be further from the truth. 

He turns the charm up to maximum with them, equal parts cheeky and suave.

At the moment, two women are at the front of the semi-organized line to speak with him. They’re nervous as sobbles.

“Should I go first,” one asks, “or you, or—?”

“We could do both of us? If that’s okay?” She glances at him.

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Gordie asks, smiling.

This seems like the sort of thing that they should have figured out while they were waiting. They’re both aware of that and flustered. His smile only makes them more flustered. They won’t be reaching a decision anytime soon.

He wraps an arm around each of them and pulls them close, laughing a little at their mute gasps of surprise.

“You can take one together. There’s more than enough of me to go around.”

He bites the inside of his cheek. A self-inflicted fat joke. That’s a new low. Still, he winks and cuddles the blushing women closer as if he doesn’t mind the implications of what he just said. They take a selfie with him. The photo gives every indication that the man taking up most of the frame is feeling great. His stomach isn’t even visible in these kinds of pictures but he sucks it in anyway.

One of the women stands on her toes to kiss him on the cheek. She runs off before he can formulate any real reaction.

Bold, but it wouldn’t be the first time. He gets much milder come-ons than Mummy, at least.

He glances out at the crowd and picks out a white-clad figure.

Ah. Speak of the giratina.

She’s waiting until the crowd dissipates to approach him. For once she has the camouflage out in the snow not to attract her own fans.

He takes a lot more selfies, signs autographs, and hands out league cards.

“One for you, one for you—no, you know what, take them all. I’ve got heaps.”

With that, the last of them are gone and it’s just mother and son.

He won’t be ashamed, not today. He puffs out his chest. He won, he won, he won.

“Come to tell me I’m a fat loser again?”

She never said those exact words, but they were definitely implied.

“No,” she says, mild. “Your number one fan just wanted to check in on you.”

Oh. Well, now he looks like a right tosser.

Is it because he did well in battle today? Is her love that conditional?

Then again, she isn’t praising him, either. He never got so much as a “good job, Gordie” growing up, so why would he expect differently now?

She gives him a little pat on the shoulder and even that is something he reads into, desperate for her affection despite everything.

He still wants to be graceful, lumbering rock pokémon and his own body and all. He still wants her approval like he did since forever.

* * *

She keeps approaching him. Every time it seems like she wants to criticize him for something or another. On rare occasions it's to give him little bits of almost-praise, just enough to throw him off his game.

He falters midway through a battle when he sees her in the crowd. He tries to shake it off, but he overthinks every move from then on out.

He wins thanks in large part to a critical hit, but his nerves are frayed by the end nonetheless.

He locks the locker room's door and leans his forehead against the cold metal. He should be out celebrating, but he’s hardly in the mood. He realizes his ring hand is shaking and clamps the other one around it, ignoring how the gem cuts into his palm.

Rock beats ice. It's not as fundamental as most type match-ups, but it's there. So why does he feel like the one being shattered?


	2. Chapter 2

The continual reminders that he isn't good enough never really stop, but Gordie gets used to it over time. He doesn't feel as sick when he sees Mummy, even after a crushing defeat.

He only gets a little irritated when she pushes his hair out of his face so everyone can "see his cute eyes." There's no use in pointing out that the sunglasses do more than enough to shield them without his hair flopping over his left eye. She probably only does it to fuss over him. It's a less tender subject than others, anyway, and it's mixed with that strange compliment.

If only he could get her to be more lenient about everything else.

* * *

Soon enough his season is up and it's time to switch with her. It’s a pain, redesigning the gym every other year, but they generate more than enough funds to do it.

Gordie never likes the change. Still, it's better than fighting with her over the gym for sole ownership. And besides, the off-season might do him some good. Maybe he can travel. Get a new pokémon or two.

For the first week off he can't help but lurk around the gym. The crowd's volume is lowered to a dull roar and vibrations through the arena. It's oddly comforting. He leans against the outside wall. His shuckle plays with a pokédoll at his feet, rolling it around with its tentacular limbs. Gordie smiles down at him.

Presently, two challengers emerge from the entrance. The men clad in neon green hiker gear wear looks that can only signify defeat.

"You lost too, huh?"

"Got blindsided by a fire fang from that darmanitan. I thought with steel types I couldn't possibly lose."

"Same here," the other says with a groan.

Sore losers. He can relate to that.

"I think she's a tad overrated. Those pecha berry creams weren't at all worth dealing with that mawkish old bag."

Gordie's head snaps up. His hands ball into fists. The fuck?

Shuckle coos at him in question, no doubt wondering what had put him on the alert.

"Oh, absolutely not," the other hiker replies. "You couldn't even see nothing with the sweater."

It wouldn't be the first gross comment made about Mummy and it wouldn't be the last, but no one ever had the absolute gall to say something to that effect within earshot of him.

Their teams had been wiped already, so he can't challenge them to a battle. Oh, well. He doesn't need pokémon to teach them a lesson.

He returns shuckle to his ball. "You don't want to see this."

He ties his jacket around his waist, sticks his training glove, the pokédoll, and sunglasses in his pockets. At the last second he remembers to take off his ring, too. It wouldn't do to potentially break his own finger. He approaches them like a gathering storm.

There's recognition in the eyes of the man who made a comment about Mummy's chest. "You're—"

Leading with a sucker punch is unsportsmanlike, but it's not as if he's on duty right now. The carefully-maintained, made-up-for-the-cameras gym leader image doesn't matter.

Fighting hand to hand isn't something he's done since primary school. It carries the same sort of exhilaration as a pokémon battle. Feels good. Maybe he should find excuses to do it more often.

He has at least six stone and half a metre on both of them, which more than balances out the fact that it's two on one. He earns a black eye and a bloody nose for his trouble, but the other men are much more duffed up than him by the end of it.

He stands over where he laid them out on the ground, for once glad how large he must look from that perspective. He leans over, jabbing his index finger at each of them in turn.

"If you ever show your faces at this gym again, I'll have a stonjourner stomp your heads in. Your run in the Galar League ends here." He spits on the ground, narrowly missing one of them. "Whoever was barmy enough to sponsor you made a big mistake."

"Why..?"

Why? He thinks it's pretty obvious.

"Are you mad? You just insulted Mu—my mother."

"I thought you hated your mum, you crazy bastard."

That gives him some pause. Does it really look that way to the public?

He never hated her. Not once in his life, not during their worst fights, not even in the depths of teen angst about not wanting to inherit the gym as an ice type leader. Maybe he should, maybe it would make things easier somehow, but he doesn’t.

With difficulty, he forces his mind back to the situation at hand.

"Remember what I said. Don't come back."

He takes his leave with a two-fingered salute. Their opinions really shouldn't matter to him, but they haunt him all the way home. He's absolutely gutted by the idea that anyone thinks he hates his mummy, especially if she thinks so, too.

Is it possible to be a rebellious son and also a mummy's boy? Probably not, but here he is.

* * *

"Mummy?"

"Gordie?"

He has a bag of frozen oran berries pressed to his swollen eye with one hand and his rotom phone held in the other.

"Just... wanted to call and tell you I love you."

* * *

She shows up at his flat the next morning. Even that fortress of solitude isn't impenetrable. 

Up until now, he could rely on a few key things as constants: it snows every day in Circhester, sweet curry is better than spicy, and Mummy won't ever invade his privacy by coming to his home.

He considers pretending he's not there as he looks through the peephole at her. Like an absolute coward. Perhaps he'd invited it by saying the "l" word the night before for the first time in years.

"I know you're here, snowflake. Please let me in."

He groans, hastily puts on his sunglasses in the hopes that they'll disguise his black eye, and opens the door. 

"Snowflake? Really?" Then a thought occurs to him: "Shouldn't you be at the gym?"

"Closed because of poor weather conditions."

Poorer than usual? It must be really bad. He wouldn't know. He spent the morning surfing the internet for cute purrloin videos, eating half a box of cereal, and intermittently pouring moomoo milk into his mouth. All without opening the curtains. Just one of those lazy mornings he can only afford when he's not working. He really needs to get out more.

Snow clings in glittering, still-formed crystals to her clothes and hair, making her have an even more queenly appearance than usual. Too bad he doesn't really match with a princely image.

Mummy cants her head and graces him with one of her smiles that she doles out by the dozen to gym challengers but seems to save for special occasions otherwise. "May I come inside?"

He grunts and turns away, waving to indicate she should follow. 

He doesn't have much in the way of seating outside of his couch. That comes with not liking guests. Fans on his terms at the gym are one thing, but he doesn't need anyone interrupting his stringent hair dyeing routine or playtime with his pokémon.

Some of his more "passionate" fans manage to track down his address, but it takes little more than sending one of his pokémon out and some choice words to send them packing.

Mummy sits down on the couch, casting her eyes over the rest of the room. Couch aside, it contains only a table and a TV with a few pieces from his rock collection on the stand. The attached kitchen, bedroom, and bath aren't much more impressive. He knows it's a step—or two, or three—down from how he used to live, but he'll take his independence over being under her roof any day.

Gordie sits down beside her on the couch. It creaks and he has a moment of concern about how it will fare with their combined weight.

He doesn't have much more time to consider it Mummy turns to him and asks, "What happened to your eye?" 

Apparently the little bit of puffiness showing beneath the barrier of the shades is enough to tip her off.

He shrugs. "Took a stealth rock to the head during training."

Never mind that that would have to necessitate him falling face-first onto one of the suspended rocks. Mummy probably knows enough about his pokémon's moves to know that the explanation is bouffalant shite.

"I tripped. Came out of nowhere," he adds.

She looks skeptical. With a graceful move he doesn't even see coming, she grabs one of his hands and holds it up to her critical eye. He had bruised the knuckles punching one of the men in the jaw. He tries not to focus on how he’s been found out and instead on how he hasn’t had his mother hold his hand in years. Her hands are tiny and delicate, barely able to wrap around a pokéball. Her fingers end in the little points of her manicured nails. They look almost comical holding his big, blunt-fingered hand that he doubtless got from his father along with his smile and the breadth of his shoulders.

She plucks the sunglasses off of his head to get a better look at his black eye, too, as if to confirm the severity of it. He blinks, feeling very exposed.

"Gordie..." 

“Fine, I'll tell you about it. Just don't do that thing you do where you grab my face so you can look at how bad it looks. You can see it fine without that." He does not need to add to his discomfort by having her squishing his cheeks.

She puffs out her own cheeks slightly, indignant.

He pulls his hand away and folds his arms. "A couple of blokes said something that pissed me off, so I thrashed them, but they got in a couple blows on me. End of story.”

“What did they say?”

“What’s it matter?”

She sighs, puts his sunglasses back on his face, and gives the uninjured side of his face a light pat. "Maybe you'll tell me someday."

Unlikely.

"Is that why you came here? Did you hear about the scuffle?"

It would be less than ideal for his career if those hikers had complained to someone important about him kicking their teeth in.

"No, I hadn't heard about that, actually." She pulls out a pokéball and turns it over in her hands. “I know you told me that I could let gym trainees adopt your old pokémon, but I never could let go of this one.”

His ice team? He never formed a connection with any of them no matter how hard both parties tried. None except—

He can't help but exclaim as she releases his snom. The tiny pokémon looks up at him and lets out a cry.

"Snow," he says, taken aback.

Yes, in his infinite wisdom, his ten year-old self nicknamed his snom Snow. Creativity was never his strong suit.

He gets down on his knees and reaches out. He hesitates, wondering if she'll remember him or, worse yet, resent him for abandoning her.

He still remembers the less than ideal circumstances in which he gave his mother ownership of his pokémon. He threw the pokéballs at her feet in the snow outside of her gym, ignoring the guilt that lurched in his stomach as he did so.

"Your spikes are looking great," he says, unable to figure out how else to—ugh—break the ice. "Super sharp."

Snow wriggles in glee and leans into the touch as if no time has passed at all. His eyes sting a little. Oh, to have the loyalty of a little icy bug.

“You’ve been taking good care of her," he says to Mummy.

“Of course.”

He'd never evolved her, not from lack of friendship, but rather because he didn't want to see the precious little larva become a merciless frosmoth. He wonders in hindsight if he'd been holding her back.

"This isn't your way of trying to get me to use ice types again, is it?"

“No. I just thought that... she misses you,” she says. "She wants to be closer to you."

Gordie looks up and makes eye contact with her, catching her thinly veiled meaning. Funny, he sees Mummy all the time, but they don't feel very close. Today has been the first day in a while she feels more like his mother and less like a gym leader breathing frost breath down his neck. It's... nice.

"Well," he says, trying to choose his words carefully, "she and I might need some time to become close friends again. But I do want to try."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I thought this was going to be a two-shot, but it's turning out longer than I would've thought, so we're still going. Whoops. Oh well, the world needs more content of ice mom and rock son.


	3. Chapter 3

Gordie sits in silence with Snow for some time after Mummy leaves. The snom still clutches the everstone he'd given her all that time ago with one of her nubby feet. He'd almost forgotten that he gave it to her instead of stopping her from evolving by sheer force of will.

Again, that guilt, that feeling that he's making her stay in her first form for his own sake. He wonders if his mother would prefer it if he stayed a child, little and manageable instead of the big, recalcitrant man he's grown into. An overgrown teenager, even, on a bad day.

"You don't have to hold that if you don't want to," he says, reaching for the everstone.

Snow makes a noise like ice cracking and shifts her body so that she's covering the stone. Figures he'd raise a pokémon that's overly attached to rocks, too.

He shifts his hand to pet her instead. "Have it your way."

* * *

Prior to the heart to heart with Mummy, he'd planned on leaving Circhester either that day or the next to go... literally anywhere else. Instead, he puts on proper clothes and hikes around outside of the city, never letting it out of his sight.

His carries the snom in his jacket pocket. He doesn't put her in her pokéball, not yet, instead reaching into his pocket to give Snow little pets with the tip of his gloved finger or feed her handfuls of snow (cannibalism?). Unsurprisingly, she feels like a little spiky ball of frigid cold even with the insulation provided by his clothes. He doesn't mind.

Mummy wasn't kidding about the poor weather conditions. He prefers it, though, as it means he doesn't encounter any other trainers. As usual, he prefers to be alone.

Gordie pauses in a shallow cave in the side of the mountain. He watches his breath seep into the air in thick clouds of vapor and pushes his sunglasses up on his head.

Yes, he wants to be alone, but... Mummy wants him here. She wants things to be better.

He glances to one side of the cave where what once must have been melted ice refroze in a thick mass. He startles at his reflection. Bundled up in cold weather clothing and with his hair unstyled, he looks so much like her.

He slams his forearm into the ice in an attempt to break it. No good. It's hard as rock.

Gordie huffs a bitter laugh, puts his sunglasses back on, and exits the cave. He tries to ignore the lump in his throat. The very world around him doesn't seem to let him forget.

The encounters with wild pokémon are surprisingly few. For once, Gordie isn't in the mood to fight, too wrapped up in his own thoughts, so most of the time he just makes a break for it. The few times that there isn't an opportunity to escape, opponents are dispatched with ease in a barrage of rocks and the occasional fire from coalassal. Snow attempts to wriggle free from the confines of his pocket to take part in the battles, too, only to be foiled by him zipping the pocket closed. He gets a valiant struggle bug attack and a pocketful of powder snow in protest.

Eventually he ends up at the very top of route 9, looking at the snow falling on the ocean and melting the moment it hits the surface. Doomed to become a part of something larger than itself. Gordie adjusts his dynamax band. Hikes always bring out the pretentious nonsense in him.

He’s brought out of his reverie by the sight of a malamar and his trainer some distance away. A trainer that’s impossible not to recognize.

“Oi,” Gordie calls. “What are you doing out here?”

“Training, what’s it look like?” Piers shouts back. “Psycho cut!”

The malamar obeys and attacks a bergmite that can barely be made out in the snow. The snom in Gordie’s pocket gets riled up by the sounds of battle again, so he puts his hand inside to reassure her.

“Couldn’t have picked better weather for it?”

“You’re out here, too, ain’tcha? Watch it!” He calls out to his malamar in time to let him dodge an attack.

“Yeah, but I’ve got a jacket.” And his... built-in insulation.

The intelion-thin Spikemuth gym leader, meanwhile, has a threadbare sweater on over his usual uniform. Even from a distance, Gordie can see him shivering.

“Very observant. Cheers,” Piers says sourly, turning away from him.

His malamar succeeds in defeating the bergmite with a payback move and he returns his pokémon to his pokéball. He starts to walk off.

“Can I talk to you?” Gordie blurts.

Piers sighs, but stops and glances back at him. “You’ve been talkin’. Why stop now?”

Gordie rolls his eyes. “Not here where I’ll watch you dying in a blizzard, I mean. You're shaking like a snorunt."

* * *

It takes minutes upon minutes of convincing, but he gets him to come back to his flat for tea. Piers seems to hunch over even more than usual in Circhester, looking around with a wary expression. They aren't friends, not exactly, but Gordie knows that he's on better terms with Piers than most gym leaders. The proximity between Spikemuth and his home are to thank for that.

Once they’re inside. Gordie pulls out every blanket he has and piles them on top of Piers until his head is all that’s visible. He takes Snow out of his pocket and sets her on the couch beside Piers.

“Alrigh’?” Piers greets Snow, who chitters at him, then turns his attention to Gordie. "So, what'd you want to talk about?"

Gordie tells him about what’s been going on with Mummy as he puts on the kettle on. The criticism, the arguments, and the most recent event of a start at reconciliation. Piers doesn't comment much, simply regarding him with that tired look he always seems to wear, but he's glad to have an audience that will understand better than a pokémon would. It feels good just to talk about it instead of bottling it all up in his own head.

In no time at all the water is boiling. He gets out a tin of tea that Milo gifted him at their last exhibition match. Is it strange to use leaves that a pokémon had shed for tea? Milo didn't seem to think so. He lets it steep in silence for the allotted amount of minutes.

"Sugar?" He glances at Piers, who shakes his head.

Gordie proceeds to load his own cup with more than a few spoonfuls but stops before it can get syrupy. He takes off his sunglasses after they get fogged up by the steam rising from the teacups. When he turns back to face Piers, he notices the obvious right away.

“Your eye looks ’orrible.”

“Got into a fight with a couple of gym challengers who insulted my mother."

"This is the same mum that has been treating you like rubbish?"

"No—yes—I don't know." He sets down Piers' tea on the table with more force than necessary and sloshes hot tea on his hand.

He curses, waving his injured hand in the air in an attempt to dispel the pain. Snow tries to help with a powder snow attack, which minimizes the burn but gives him a new problem of numbed fingers. Between that and the bruising he just seems to have it out for his hands lately.

"Thanks, Snow," he says through grit teeth.

Piers wiggles an arm free from the confines of the blanket pile and reaches for the tea.

"Anyone ever told you you've got some anger issues, mate?" He asks.

"I think anyone'd react the way I did to burning their hand."

"Not that. The rest of it." Piers' eyes fall shut as he lifts the tea to his face, inhaling, then exhaling. "Some serious issues with your confidence, too. See it all the time in the trainers in Spikemuth."

Gordie scoots Snow to one side so that she rests between him and Piers and sits down on the couch. He tries not to let himself get worked up over the comment. It'd be a self-fulfilling prophecy. He takes a scalding gulp of the sugary tea, then another. He isn't angry and he isn't insecure. He isn't. An angry, insecure person wouldn't be a successful gym leader. Or a successful human being, even.

"Let's say you're right. What does that have to do with my mum?"

"Ain't nothin' about her. It's about you." 

Snow crawls onto Gordie's lap, calming him a hell of a lot more than the torture by tea. He rubs her exposed head with his index finger, inducing the snom equivalent of a purr.

"Your mum may have her own problems, problems she's taking out on you, but you can't change her. You're all you got control over." Piers sips his tea.

Gordie takes a more measured drink of his, too, but when he speaks it still comes out bitter. "So I'm just supposed to take it when she criticizes my battling skills or points out that I'm fat as a house?"

It makes him feel sick to even acknowledge his weight aloud, but Piers seems unmoved. Gordie wonders if he's ever gotten flak for his gangly physique. He must have, online if nowhere else. 

"No. You walk away, right off. She don't get to be around you when she treats you like that. An' you let yourself get angry, then you let it go. Don't hold onto it like you do."

"You barely know me," Gordie mutters.

"I know enough. I've seen that face on many a Team Yell grunt."

He doesn’t know how to feel about being compared to members that weird fan club. He runs a hand through his hair.

"Okay. Maybe I am a little angry and hold a grudge sometimes. Especially with her. I guess I always just take it out on gym challengers. And when it's the off-season I... stew." It sounds horrible when he puts it like that. "Yeah. I need to learn to deal with my feelings like a man.”

"Like a man?" Piers tilts his head far to one side. “So, real badly or not at all?”

Gordie frowns.

“That’s how I dealt with things for a while, anyway. Don’t work. Much better to express them. Ever consider taking up songwriting?” At Gordie's look, he shrugs. "Just a suggestion."

How did he go from giving good advice to that? Gordie finishes off the last of his tea.

“I appreciate the advice, but you don't have to turn the wise big brother thing on on me. I’m one too, you know,” Gordie says, trying to lighten the mood.

"Oh, yeah. You've got three siblings, right?"

"Four."

"How're they doin'?"

Gordie's heart sinks as he realizes he doesn't know. Some brother he is. He's avoided going to see them because they're a package deal with Mummy.

"Good. They're good." And they probably are, but he resolves to go visit to know for sure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I didn't plan on Piers showing up, but much like in canon he just appears to be a slightly shirty but ultimately warmhearted bro.


End file.
